The first blade was drawn before the dawn.
The Vale of Kings, once a sanctuary for the bones of monarchs, now echoed with the fury of the Hollowborn horde. Thousands spilled across the pale basin — twisted men, spectral wraiths, constructs of bone and malice — surging forward beneath a blackened sky. The Monolith pulsed behind them, the Hollow King's shadow flaring like a crown of devouring night.
Kaelen stood at the front line, Crownfire humming at his fingertips.
Behind him, his company formed into ranks — knights of broken orders, wardens from the drowned south, exiles and mercenaries and outcasts alike. They bore no banners. Only purpose.
"Hold the stones," Kaelen said, loud enough for all to hear. "If we lose the obelisks, the Monolith takes the crowns."
Lys lifted her staff. "And if we fall?"
"Then we fall facing it."
Aelric limped into position beside Kaelen. "Any last words?"
Kaelen looked at the onrushing horde, then at the ember blazing in his hand. "Not yet."
Then the Hollowborn struck.
The First Wave
It began with smoke — thick, suffocating clouds that spilled from the Hollowborn's mouths as they ran. Blades sang through mist. The first clash sent screams across the Vale.
Kaelen met the charge with fire.
The ember flared through him, channeling through the Crown of Erelthane. A torrent of searing light burst from his palm, cutting a burning path through the first rank of enemies. They fell, smoking and shrieking, dissolving into ash. Behind him, his warriors surged.
Lys shattered attackers with wind-laced magic, her incantations slicing through armor and bone. Aelric, blade in one hand and throwing knives in the other, cut down two Hollowborn before they reached the second obelisk.
But they kept coming.
From every tomb and broken crypt, more rose. Some floated above the ground, robes trailing like oil, while others scuttled on limbs grown too long, eyes like coals in a drowned fire.
Kaelen rallied his troops to the third pillar — where the Crown of Halvyr had once been enshrined.
"This is the hinge," he growled. "They take this, they break our line!"
They held — barely.
Steel met claw. Light met shadow. The ground burned black with ember-fire and dark ichor. Each death sent a tremor through Kaelen's chest, as if the crowns themselves cried out.
Within the Monolith – The Hollow King
From within the Monolith's chamber, the Hollow King stood unmoving, arms crossed over his skeletal chest. Around him, the spirits of ancient kings writhed in silent torment, their crowns pulsing dimly beneath veils of obsidian.
"She drags him forward," he whispered, sensing Kaelen's movements across the Vale. "The blood remembers."
He opened a hand — and from it emerged a new creation.
The Unnamed.
It was not like the others. No twisted soldier, no broken ghost. This one was old, bound by the Hollow King's own soul. A titan of bone and bronze, eyes burning with ancestral memory. It had once been a king — now reborn as the weapon to end Kaelen's line.
"Go," he said to the Unnamed. "End the line of fire."
And it stepped into the world, shaking the Monolith as it went.
The Second Line Falls
Kaelen saw the thing before he felt its presence.
The Unnamed emerged from the smoke like a mountain wearing armor. Twice the height of any man. A jagged helm crowned its featureless face. Its weapon — a chained flail wreathed in black flame — swung in lazy arcs, each motion causing the earth to crack.
Soldiers broke. Some fled. Others died screaming.
Kaelen moved forward alone.
The ember burned hotter than ever before, pulsing in rhythm with his breath. His fingers closed around the fifth Crown's sigil — and power poured through him.
Golden fire leapt from his shoulders. His sword ignited. And when the Unnamed brought its flail down, Kaelen met it mid-strike — and stopped it.
The impact blasted a crater in the earth, throwing bodies and stone alike into the air. Kaelen was driven to his knees but held.
He rose.
"Your master is wrong," Kaelen hissed. "I remember."
He struck.
Elsewhere in the Vale – Lys
Lys led a strike team to the far end of the Vale, where smaller obelisks — repositories of the kings' names — were under siege. She fought like a storm, her spells tearing apart ranks of Hollowborn.
But her power came at a cost.
Each spell pulled at the bond the Halvyr Crown had left in her — a cold voice that whispered in her mind. She ignored it. She fought harder. Beside her, a young woman from the Red Hills fell. Lys cried out and unleashed a pulse of magic so strong it cracked the stones beneath her.
"I will not lose them again," she muttered.
The Final Stand at the Monolith
Kaelen's duel with the Unnamed raged for minutes that felt like hours.
They clashed again and again, each strike echoing like a bell of the end times. Around them, Hollowborn and human alike fell back, giving space to the titans. Flames danced across Kaelen's shoulders. The Unnamed roared, its voice like shattered mountains.
Then Kaelen saw it — the flaw.
A fragment of the Unnamed's soul still glowed within its chest — flickering, human.
Kaelen drew upon the fifth Crown.
He leapt high, blade burning brighter than the sun, and drove it into the heart of the monster.
The Unnamed screamed. Light poured from its chest. Its body cracked — and exploded.
Ash rained across the Vale.
Silence fell. Hollowborn trembled.
Kaelen stood amid the ruin, the ember in his chest dimming.
He turned, bloodied but alive.
"We march," he said to his people, voice carrying over the scorched stone. "To the last four Crowns."